


Adam and Eve

by Kerink



Category: Devilman (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Angst, Canon Typical Violence, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-23
Updated: 2018-07-07
Packaged: 2019-03-08 12:04:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,580
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13457892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kerink/pseuds/Kerink
Summary: The light of the sun flared off the moon, a lighthouse in the endless night, and the lone survivor, eternally damned, was drawn to it, moth and flame. What remained of his love cradled in his arms. He had torn down the heavens from above and within and the wound was cauterized, like so many earthly meteors, and Ryo had to show Akira, cold and limp, that there really were no rabbits left.- - -Even at the end of the world, Ryo refuses to give up.





	1. Genesis

**Author's Note:**

> this will probably be updated fairly slowly, as i'm in grad school and pretty busy. but i'm highly motivated to finish this as i have a set ending in mind, so if you like it please support me!

In the ending God brought down the heavens to destroy the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the cracked and brittle piece of what remained. And God saw there was nothing that remained of either demon or human and it was good. The heavens retreated, passing through the darkness to the beyond where goodness and love rested until called upon by Him. The pieces of the earth bobbed aimlessly in the void of eternal nothing, charred and ripped apart, volcanic.

The light of the sun flared off the moon, a lighthouse in the endless night, and the lone survivor, eternally damned, was drawn to it, moth and flame. What remained of his love cradled in his arms. He had torn down the heavens from above and within and the wound was cauterized, like so many earthly meteors, and Ryo had to show Akira, cold and limp, that there really were no rabbits left.

\- - -

Tears pearled around his eyes and hovered with no gravity to steal the sorrow Ryo could not contain. Bobbing round his head like a mourning veil. Grief had been bottled up since he had been cast from the heavens and now it was exploding, not a Molotov but bubbles, soft and pure. He had known no emotion, happiness nor sorrow, since God, but Akira split him open and he feared he would sob endlessly. His chest heaved, his throat ached, and he wailed a lover’s wail, Akira cradled in his arms. 

So handsome, so loving, so pure. Akira, Devilman. Carved from obsidian. He had been held in those arms so many times but not enough, held to that chest so many times but not enough. How he wished Akira, in his demon hunger, black hole, had swallowed him up and held him in his gut, let them become one. A man who cradled the mangled bodies of kittens, the man who tore demons down the middle. Ryo wished he had done so to his body, not his heart.

Ryo’s wings were limp at his side now that there was no longer a threat of Akira being ripped from his arms. He wasn’t sure if it was God’s mercy or wrath that allowed Ryo to hold onto Akira’s lifeless body. After all, God never took the earth, just made it begin again, wiped what Ryo loved from it. Like the earth, Akira was gone, all that was left was a husk. And like the earth, Ryo clung to it, refused to leave it, would cradle it in his arms, protect it until God saw fit to wipe all of existence of His creation and start anew.

He lost his divinity the first time he stood up to his Father. He lost Akira the second time. He couldn’t tell which had been more traumatic to him.

Unlike before, when he had waited for the earth to cool and then to freeze, there was no meditation of revenge in his heart, no fight left in him. This time, when he hibernated, all he could feel was the pain of loss, the weight of a love he had not felt in trillions of years. This time, his hands shook not as he held himself, grieving his beloved demons, they shook as he caressed the face of his true beloved.

His skin was luminescent in this form, and Akira was almost lost in the shadow of the crater they were hid in. When Ryo kissed him, the touch was over before it had begun. He buried himself in the bare chest of his Akira, his Devilman, and he wept.

\- - -

Time moves differently when one lives outside its reach. 

Ryo watched, huddled in on himself, wings around himself, peeking between icy feathers, as the earth spun around itself, colliding and spitting and spluttering, weeping for itself. Akira was at his side, as he always had been, as he always would be.

Ryo had always thought of himself as the earth. The savior of life, the one who created and protected, the one who worked in the background of freewill and ultimately determined who on this outpost planet would succeed and who would fail. Amongst the demons, he had been their king, their lord, their savior. He who had given them order in the chaos, allowed to be of their own nature but without the weight of full control. Lord Satan would pull the strings that needed to be pulled and would delegate orders that needed to be handed out, and it was good. There was freedom but there were limits. He was respected, he was loved.

And Akira had been his moon. Created from Ryo’s mind and efforts and planning. Akira orbited him, looking for orders, protection, love. Ryo had placed Akira just outside his reach, close enough to be useful but not to be a danger. Useful for companionship, useful for killing demons, useful for manipulating humans. Dangerous for all his strength, his instincts, his passion. Useful for sparking Ryo’s heart, dangerous for sparking Ryo’s heart.

But as the pieces of the earth chose whether to leave the nest or return to their mother, Ryo realized that it was he who was the moon. It was Akira that protected life, it was Akira who saved the weak and fed the hungry and comforted the dying. It was in Akira’s arms all felt at home. And Ryo was always outside his orbit, being drawn in but always running away. His presence manipulating Akira’s ability to love. Akira’s passion like the ocean – comforting and safe, a deadly tsunami, all at Ryo’s will.

Ryo cold, always shifting, changing as he pleased. But the earth was always there, steady, reliable. An inversion of Akira. A demon heart that wore a human skin.

\- - -

Years had passed, and he still had not lay Akira to rest. At first, Ryo had simply not thought to do so. Demons didn’t. And then, once he had realized he ought to, he decided selfishly not to. Who would he curl up against to ward off the frigid cold of the endless night? Who would he have to lay next to as he gazed at the heavenly bodies? Who would listen so intently as he spoke, thoughts and feelings that jumbled up and sat inside of him, biased, black and white, cognitive dissonance, human mind and devil heart at war within him. At least now, like this, Akira would hear him out.

Eventually, Ryo decided that this was not what Akira would want. Akira wouldn’t want himself to be hoarded. He wouldn’t want Ryo to cling to him, wasting away on this moon while the earth reformed under them. Akira would want to be buried as a human, with a cross at his head, would want to rejoin the soil, would want to rejoin God.

Ryo lay in the crater, his head on Akira’s chest, looking at nothing, his heart shot up with arrows. He just knew that if he moved too far from his Akira he would vomit blood. 

Ryo wasn’t sure what kept him from rotting, the vacuum of space or his demon flesh or Ryo’s sheer stubborn will.

\- - -

The earth was healing, alive and vibrant in a way even Ryo, an angel, a devil, had needed time to wrap his mind around. It hadn’t felt that long, that he and Akira had been laying here having a one-sided conversation, but the proof was right before him. It wasn’t perfect, it wasn’t home, still a husk, but it was finally back together. Black earth with popping, molten veins.

The ring of debris had mostly settled. A new moon was forming. So similar yet so different from its sister, which had given refuge to the lovers all these countless years. This new moon was him, he decided. A new promise of a new future. At the creation of the first moon, Ryo had gained Akira in body. At the creation of the second, Ryo became determined to gain Akira in heart and soul.

All cells are the same, after all, and soon they would have a new home.

Ryo settled Akira down gently, on a patch of soil and rock that would see the sun. Akira, Ryo had decided, was not a corpse, he was a bulb. Like the demons of the past, he was in hibernation, waiting to be awoken by his Lord. Ryo had decided this and so it would be. There was no alternative. Ryo was the god of this planet, of these lifeforms, of his demons. And his will be done.

Cool hands settled onto plastic flesh, starting at the top of Akira’s scalp and Ryo closed his eyes and thought of villages and tribesmen and seeds and Akira, beautiful perfect Akira. Each cell had to be agitated individually. Each atom gently shaken awake by a mother’s hand. It would take time, Ryo knew this, to rouse each cell and to encourage new ones to grow, but Ryo was prepared to wait. Prepared to rip off his own wings if that was what Akira needed to walk again. Prepared to infuse Akira with his own heavenly blood if it would make that black hole heart of his beat. It would take time, and in that time they would have a home again, ancient and violent but a home nonetheless.

On the first day Satan said, let there be life, and it was so.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you'll notice i'm not capitalizing earth, heaven, or hell at any point in the story. i'm doing it on purpose to represent how little ryo cares about them despite being so entranced by them. no one's said anything but i figured i'd say it preemptively.
> 
> also, there's a reason i keep calling akira obsidian. google around a bit on obsidian's alternate name, apache tear, to reveal hidden symbolism o;

Laying in twilight of feelings and thoughts running blurred together like so many nebulas and gaseous clouds was nothing. Drowning the shards of Schrodinger’s heart, in tact until acknowledged, was nothing. Running fingers down ghost-cold obsidian skin, frozen in time like cycling life times, a death shroud for the final moment in which Akira looked at him as though a friend, a confidante, an ally - that was nothing.

Nothing compared to running fingers down prickling, goose-pimpled flesh that had always given to touch but not like this. Nothing compared to Schrodinger grinding brittle shards into seeping wounds. Nothing compared to being so keenly aware of the fear of rejection.

And Ryo would be lying if he denied the existence of moments where he had to tear away from his beloved’s slowly warming flesh, holding onto himself, tearing at hair and feathers, screaming to the heavens and cursing a Father that would remind him of pain of loss. Why wouldn’t God just kill him and be done with it? Why cast him from grace and allow him to find home again only to take it, allow him to find love again only to take it? Why allow him to know the earth and Akira, allow him to stake his claim, only to tear it away over and over and over again?

There were times where Ryo found himself, disheveled and shaking, tears floating freely before they spilled. A constant stream of bubbles floating aimlessly around the moon to the point where Ryo would have to occasionally relocate himself and his Akira. He would find that in these times, when the fine and powered remnants of his fragile heart were salt in the wound his heart had left behind as it was torn from him, he found in those times that maybe it would be easier to just kill Akira and be done with it. Be done with loss, be done with hope, be done with trying to connect to another living being, trying to find a home God had kicked him from, trying to find heaven in an existence set up to be his own personal hell. Tailored just for him, let the punishment suit the crime, if you love the earth and its inhabitants so much then here have a sample free of charge.

But the thought of existence without Akira by his side made him want to end it all. Trap himself in ice and sleep for eternity. There could be no life without Akira, for him or for anyone else. Akira, the heart and soul of the earth itself. Akira, the earth manifesting in the form of a man to meet Ryo in the material realm, match Ryo’s devotion, his love. So, he knew he couldn’t stop. He couldn’t leave him. The thought of tearing himself from Akira was more painful than any pain Ryo had experienced, even his fall from heaven. So, he kept going.

There were 37.2 trillion cells in a human body. A complete, human body. Ryo knew this. He had studied humans so intently, even when he thought himself one and needed to know all he could in order to study Devilman. Ryo knew all about synaptic connections and reflexes and the lobes of the brain, he knew all about the delicate mesh the neurons, scaffolding, a trellis for a tangling mess of knowledge and thoughts and feelings. He knew to avoid Akira’s mind entirely until the body was back online. He couldn’t have Akira half alive and in torment, trapped inside a corpse.

He worked slow and thoughtful and careful. It didn’t take much to stir the cells, just a gentle nudge of divine power. But even still, with so much to consider and so much work to do, by the time Ryo was carrying Akira from their hideaway back to the remains of their home, the earth was mostly calm.

The sky was orange now, the air a thick and heavy fog. He lay Akira to rest on ground so impossibly hard. In every direction, mountains were broken up by puddles of something that wanted to be water but wasn’t quite right yet. Volcanic rock and snow shared space until sputtering explosive lava made a break for mastery of the planet, and even then the flow was cooled before it had the chance at the title. Ryo had seen this earth before, passively and from God’s side. He had seen the planet young and growing, volcanos shooting out primordial ground covering to fight back the sea, scaffolding for future life, a trellis. 

He finalized Akira’s rebirth in this infant land. At the side of a small pond he lay Akira to rest, where the ground was warm and new, not yet sharp volcanic glass but porous and leaving indents on their skin. Ryo caressed Akira’s face as much as he woke him, laying healing kisses on his eyes and lips, fingers mapping his strong jaw and high cheeks, his thumbs running tenderly down the slope of his nose, massaging his scalp and combing his wild hair.

Neither of them had changed in this billion years, and neither would. Ryo had burst from the womb of God’s light. Akira had been baptized in blood, Amon’s body on the sacrificial altar. They were as timeless as the moon around the earth, until the time the sun would decide it had had enough of watching their dance. This is what Ryo had desired most, even when his mind was empty of the knowledge of devils and eternity, listening to Jenny’s lullaby over the boosted bass of the Sabbath; Ryo had offered Death a trade, his best soldier for this innocent human, and Death had accepted thinking Ryo a fool.

Ryo pulled away from the press of lips, eyes sliding open to gaze at his beloved, heart hammering wildly in his chest, a beast trapped. His hand stilled on the side of Akira’s face, thumb pressed under his eye, and Ryo willed them to open.

And it was so.

Akira pressed his eyes more tightly together before he opened them with a groan. He blinked away the glare of the sun against Ryo’s ethereal form, turning his face to the side, hissing in pain.

“How are you feeling?”

“Like I just got hit by a train.” The words left Akira’s mouth slowly, as if his body was remembering how to move his tongue, how to constrict his vocal chords. It probably was.

“You’ve been asleep for a while, it’s to be expected. Take it easy now, don’t try to sit up too fast just- Here let me help you, there you go, I’ve got you, Akira, I’ve got you. Don’t try to stand just- Here. Just sit here a moment and get your bearings.”

Ryo was propping Akira up more than Akira was sitting up on his own, legs splayed out before him, his body swaying slightly with vertigo. He closed his eyes again, pressing a shaky palm to his face. Akira held his head for a moment and Ryo simply watched him, face blank and he knew Akira must be able to hear his heart for all its thundering. Eventually, though, Akira was able to steady himself and he looked around, eyes squinting.

“Where are we? What time is it?”

“I don’t know.”

With his brow furrowed, in either pain or confusion or some mixture of both, Akira finally looked to his companion. There was a moment where Ryo could see on his face – always so expressive – that Akira was trying to piece something together. That he knew something was missing, something was off, but he couldn’t quite figure it out. This moment, this time, uncanny valley in this uncanny valley. He looked around again, more alert this time and Ryo saw the bob of his Adam’s apple.

“Ryo.” The word a whisper, a prayer.

“Akira,” he parroted, calling out to his lover in the mist.

“Where _are_ we?”

“Earth.”

“Oh.”

Akira looked at him again, seeing him with fresh eyes. Akira looked at him, up and down, and Ryo wasn’t ashamed of his nudity, modesty a human invention, a human punishment. If anything, he was more ashamed to not be in front of Akira in the form Akira knew. He was still slight, still blond, still pale as moonlight, but his hair was long now, silky smooth as corn silk and wild and windswept, his breasts hung heavy on his chest and his shoulder-most wings instinctively wrapped around him to shield them from Akira’s curious gaze, ashamed to not be in the body Akira used to bathe and swim with. His hip-most wings wrapped around his waist to hide his genitals from view for good measure. Half of what was between his legs was familiar to Akira, but only half.

“Oh,” Akira whispered, shifting in his seat. His Adam’s apple bobbed again. “What happened?” And the question wasn’t a question, it was hard and demanding and Ryo could feel tension rumble through Akira’s wide and sturdy shoulders, his bare and barreled chest.

Ryo had never hesitated to answer Akira in the seventeen years he had sat before his friend in rooms sterile pristine, in warehouse filled to the brim with blood and writhing bodies. He had never shied away from his truth before. This moment was different, keyed up and threatening, on the precipice of something. “There was a fight.” Ryo rolled his tongue around in his mouth and he could tell by the shifting set of Akira’s jaw that he wasn’t going to get out of this conversation.

“There was a fight,” he started again, less conversationally, more airy, controlled. “You were struck down, and God and his angels destroyed everything.” For once, Ryo turned away from Akira’s gaze, his wings wrapping around him closer, dirty and vile, tainting Akira in his presence. “We’re the only ones left.”

And all at once he was on his back, the wind knocked out of his lungs and caught in his chest as a claw tightened around his long and skinny throat. Ryo gasped out, hands scrambling for purchase at Akira’s hand around his neck. He cracked open his eyes and looming above him was Devilman, eyes glowing white with fury, wings blotting out the sun. Ryo knew he couldn’t die like this, in fact, couldn’t die unless the slaying was blessed by God Himself, but Ryo could know torture and pain and suffering, and he knew Akira’s convictions well enough to know he just might receive that from this beautiful, perfect devilman.

“Satan,” Akira hissed, claws drawing blood. Ryo tried to squawk out Akira’s name, returning his call, praying with his eyes that no, not Satan, Ryo, your old friend, Ryo. “You demon!” he bellowed. “You fucking monster!” Ryo tried to shake his head and that only encouraged Akira to squeeze tighter.

Getting nowhere fast, Ryo began to weakly kick his legs at Akira’s hulking form, feet grazing against thick, coarse fur and abs carved from obsidian. His nails, short and perfect, barely scratching Amon’s warrior skin that Akira wore as armor. 

With strength gathered up from spite alone, Akira stood, Ryo still in his hold until he threw the angel. Ryo didn’t have time to realize, didn’t have time to catch himself on the thick and poisonous wind, before he was colliding with the ground across the small tide pool he had lay Akira’s lifeless form beside. He skirt across lava rock and chips of glass, catching one wing on a stromatolite as it splashed into the water.

He groaned, laying on his bruised and bleeding side, listening to Akira’s claws _clack clack clack_ on the rock and mineral debris as he approached him. “Akira,” he croaked. 

His hair was gathered up in Akira’s claw and he was dragged up, Akira’s demon face snarling in his own. Ryo felt a bead of blood drip from his nose and past his panting, parted lips.

“I trusted you! I believed in you! Look at me!” He was crying, hot and anguished. “Look at-“ with a monstrous hand he motioned out at the landscape. Ryo watched the quivering of his lower lip and they both knew he was too weak to call this wasteland home. “Look at it all… Look at what you did!”

“I didn’t do this,” Ryo wheezed, pleading. “Akira, please, I didn’t-“

“This is all because of you!”

“God-“

“No!” Akira moved closer, shouted in his face and splattered Ryo with spittle. “No this is because of you! God wouldn’t have done anything if you didn’t wake the demons, if you didn’t tell them- If you didn’t-!” Akira let out another roaring cry. He released Ryo and stalked a few paces away, screaming with hands balled and fisted in his eyes.

Ryo stood slowly with his legs trembling and threatening to give. He curled his wings protectively around himself, hands twisted together. They stood in the weight of Akira’s grief, and Ryo could tell with each new batch of sobs that bubbled up out of him that a different part of Akira’s memory was awakened, striking the devilman again and again with the pain of loss. He listened to Akira heave as his stomach reacted violently to this memory or that, but with nothing within him he merely gagged and shook. His head hung low on his thick neck, face hidden in claws, tears replacing blood stains.

Eventually Akira collapsed, the burden of his pain too heavy, and from his knees he felt onto one hand, digging his claws into the rock. His wings hung at his sides, his tail like a rope snaking between his legs, limp and useless. Ryo approached him slowly, kneeling at his side again and placing a tender and forgiving hand on his shoulder. Ryo spent a moment marveling at the difference in their size, his hand barely eclipsed half of Akira’s shoulder proper; Ryo didn’t want to imagine himself below the beast again, hands grappling at shoulder blades.

“Akira,” he whispered, soothing, begging to hear a mating call, begging for the answer to his prayers.

“Why?” Akira’s voice was broken, weak, desperate.

“I don’t know,” and the reply was honest. “To hurt me, I suppose.” Ryo moved his hand to pet at Akira’s hair.

With a wet sniff Akira sat up. He turned to Ryo and Ryo let out a soft sound at the sight before him. Akira’s eyes were swollen, still boiling over in rage and sadness, there was tracks of snot that mirrored Ryo’s own tracks of blood. Ryo sat up, squatting on his knees, and he wiped at Akira’s face, soothing and gentle. Blessedly, Akira let him.

“Is this Hell?”

“In a sense.” Ryo sat back, kneeling again, his hands on his knees. “But not in reality, no.”

“But-“ and here Akira turned away for a moment, clenching and unclenching one claw, “I died.” 

Ryo nodded, ducking his head down to find Akira’s gaze again. “I brought you back.”

Ryo regretted very little in his long, long life, but that admission easily sky rocket to the top of his list, for as soon as Akira processed the words, mouthing them quietly back to himself and trying to get his sluggish mind to process them, fire was reignited in his belly and he roared back up to full height.

“You _what_?!”

Ryo stood as well, not wanting to be tossed about again. “I brought you back.” He met Akira’s rage-filled eyes, trying to tear down his own mask so Akira could see the honesty within him. “After awhile I realized that you weren’t rotting and determined it meant you were still alive.” Akira bristled at that, looking around shiftily, eyes landing on the large moon taking up a significant portion of the sky. His gaze flicked to Ryo occasional as he kept talking. “And I remembered that after God attacked us the first time, despite the devastation to the planet, many demons were able to survive and revive after millions of years. So, I simply brought you back.”

Akira raked his claws down his face again, running them through his hair with a breathy laugh. “You simply brought me back,” the words were somewhere between disbelief and disdain. He turned his full attention to Ryo, eyes pained and searching, but mouth curled up in disgust. “You’re-“ he paused, panting out breath he didn’t need. Ryo knew enough about the human body, knew enough about demons, knew enough about Akira, to know that he was on the verge of another panic attack or bought of hysteria or whatever sort of fit his swirling emotions wanted to throw. “You- You can’t just do that to people.” Akira wasn’t shouting and that somehow struck Ryo deeper.

“I wanted you back.”

“I’m not your science experiment!” Akira threw his arms to the side, taking half a step closer.

“That isn’t what I meant.”

“Then what?!” Akira motioned around to the planet, to himself, voice raising in his agitated state. “So what, I’m you fucking play thing? You’re sick! I knew the devil was evil but this-!” Akira retreated his half a step and Ryo went to meet him, hand raising in offering.

Akira sneered down at his hand, surprise mixing the expression and Ryo just wished for once his heart was a little less human and a little more down to earth.

Shaking his head, Akira back pedaled further away. “I wish you’d just left me. I wish you’d just finished me off.”

“Akira.”

“I wish I was dead, I wish I was with Miki and Miko and Taro and Mom and Dad.”

“Akira-!”

Akira met Ryo’s eyes. “I wish I’d never met you. I wish I’d died a human, scared and in pain, then ever spent a second with you!”

And the earnestness in his voice had Ryo blanching, hand dropping a fraction and Ryo frozen as he had been leaning into his beloved, trying to make him understand.

Before he could recover, Akira was spreading his wings. “Don’t come looking for me. I-“ Akira closed his eyes for a beat before looking at Ryo, no sadness or confusion or searching desperate disbelief in his eyes. “I can’t be around you. Stay away from me.”

Before he could recover, Akira was gone, and before he could understand, Ryo knew, that he was well and truly alone once again.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i said updates would be slow
> 
> sorry this is so short after youve waited so long, i literally just needed to get SOMETHING on paper so i could get back in the groove

Sinking spiraling pattering splattering cold alone I love you.

Dizzying swirling flying soaring boring I need you.

Pressing messing drowning regressing desperation miss you.

There was no possible reason to believe that he was wanted beyond this patch of land of earth of magma and gasses and tectonics and snow. Hot cold vapor aerate agitate pour your misery into heavens that either listen with glee and satisfaction or tune you out Father can you hear me? Wandering aimless and numb to shards of broken volcanic glass that slice divine flesh blind to blinding brightness am I floating am I sinking what is water what is air am I drowning suffocating Akira are you there? Demons are as territorial as humans battle royal this land is my land this land is your land heart is aching breaking devastating I go this way you go that way split up team divide and conquer. Are these plants am I hallucinating am I thirsty or am I thirsty was Akira right and they were both in Hell?

Memorandum Jenny take a memo O Heavenly Father hallowed be Thy name Thy Kingdom come Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven learn to share unfair Ryo never played well with others.

\- - -

At first the only thing that brought Ryo comfort was the patch of land he’d lay Akira on. It had long since gone cold of body heat but hydrothermals let Ryo pretend. Eyes closed and wings about him it almost felt like Akira holding him. Almost.

When he grew tired of sulking he sat up skipping stones determined to make this place home. He stood, hopscotch on stromatolites crown of volcanic glass in his feet Wandering Jew cursed for mocking Jesus.

He had hardly the strength to hold his wings up, let alone fly, letting them drag behind him, feeling the pinch of caught feathers. Eventually he didn’t even break pace when they were torn from him. It wasn’t that he wanted to hurt, he was never one for doing penance, he simply hadn’t the strength to do anything about it. His wounds were superficial anyway, artificial, angels were made of divine light and nothing else.

\- - -

Never once did he fool himself into thinking Akira would come looking for him. Rather he was The Fool, wandering into a great unknown without plan or purpose, moving just to move, moving because of something within him that told him to.

So Ryo mused on the water. What percentage had been collected from earth alpha? Were his tears still a ring around the moon or would they be repurposed? Reduce reuse recycle. At smaller pools he stuck his feet in resting refreshing sighing out his toxic breath into this toxic world, shoulders slumped and mind buzzing. He’d never had absolutely nothing to do before. It was maddening. Why did humans take vacations? At larger pools he ducked his head in and tried to see what he could see. In deeper pools there was nothing but murky black, in shallow ones he knew better than to purposefully crack his skull on a stromatolite.

While the early stages of life were like children to him, a positive pregnancy test, he also yearned for the day he had something he could interact with. There was only so much blood he could drip into the soil and pools before he doubted the potency of his magic on this new earth.

\- - -

Never ending sorrow was a symptom of Hell, Ryo knew that. Bobbing in the depths of the ocean, bouncing between geysers caught up in currents Ryo allowed the ocean to use and abuse him. The deep ocean was a mother’s womb and Ryo was eagerly awaiting pregnancy. Any single celled organism would do.

He was considering crawling into a fault line and waiting out implantation.

\- - -

He didn’t need to breathe, he didn’t need to eat. Ryo moved about the ocean like he was meant for it, built for it, his wings like a duck’s. It was disorienting and dizzying where the light couldn’t reach but Ryo had spent life times outside The Light. He was used to making his own.

\- - -

Crawling out into the oozing mess of a hellish landscape God dared to call an infant planet, Ryo robbed this new earth the opportunity of having its own life forms take the first step upon its surface. The ocean Ryo left was teaming but shy, considering. Things that were plants but not quite. Animals but not quite. Leaves trying for seaweed but rooted shallow and caught by the currents and tides. Creatures that looked something between a tongue and a horseshoe crab. Jellyfish were the only thing Ryo could identify without calling upon his limited omniscience. The water was a murky blue-green and the sun was fleeting and trying.

It was heaven to feel a body brush against his again.

But so much had transpired above ground while Ryo was away, buried in his watery grave. It was frigid for starters; a cold Ryo hadn’t felt since he’d been encased in ice. A cold so different from the vacuum of space. This cold was wet, imposing, oppressing. Ryo had lived through many ice ages before and knew enough to tell this one was close to ending but it was shocking and nearly unbearable after the comparatively warm waters he had been traversing.

In the distance were volcanic smoke stacks pumping; the air was thick with fog and dense, low-hanging clouds. For the first time in a literal epoch, Ryo took to the sky, the volcano a beacon in the bleak morning of this new world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm also on twitter (kerinky) & tumblr (kerink)


End file.
